# Clevelander Humi Cooler Issues HELP!



## beerhound34 (Oct 6, 2015)

So my amazing wife got me a new humi for my B-Day a couple weeks ago. Since she has started dabbling in the hobby she figured I needed a bigger humi to store more cigars for the both of us. She found the "Clevelander" model and thought the stainless steel would match the kegerators. While I was supper stoked at the wife's gift, this thing has been a little concerning. The temp only goes up to 64 and the shelves seem like they might be spanish cedar (same grain pattern) but are sealed with a poly or some other type of clear coat. 

So here's the problem I need help/advise/ get a Noob straightened out posts made. The unit has been sitting a week and a half now. I let it sit as is for two days before plugging it in. During those two days it sat at 68* and 65 rh. I then turned it on and set the temp on 64. Problem now is the internal thermo says 59 degrees and has been staying around that. The humidity level is hovering around 51. I purchased a pound of heartfelt beads and got them on Saturday. I split the pound of beads into two of the HF mesh bags. At first i don't think i misted the beads enough as they sat in there for two days with an increase in the rh by only 5. So i dumped all the beads out onto a cookie sheet, got the majority of the beads clear and now back into the mesh bags. 

I have two hygrometers, one that came with the Clevelander and another I just bought. The new one went into a boliva bag for 36 hours and seems to be spot on. The Hygro built into the cooler is only 1% lower than the calibrated hygro. 

Sorry for the ramble, but my questions are am I not giving this thing enough time to acclimate, am i doing something wrong or do i need to just send this unit back? I'm half tempted to just unplug it so it will get back to a better temp but then i loose the benefit of having the air movement. Could really use some advise from the pros out there. I am anxious to get this puppy set up right so I can buy mor gars!


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## Champagne InHand (Sep 14, 2015)

I don't consider myself a pro but you want you temp above 65F. You don't want to encourage any fungal growth. The proper humidification from the beads, which are supposed to have the same benefits as PG solution as opposed to just water only works if the humidity is right. Maybe time will help but I bought a gallon of distilled water and boiled a cup and dissolved a very small but appropriate amount of Potassium Metabisulfite, which is the sulfur used in winemaking. I then poured that back into the gallon jug. I use the premixed stuff from the brick and mortar so far on the foam and when rehydrating Xikar crystals. The distilled water mix is now available, when and if the Boveda bags are enough in the tupperdors. I store wine below 65F most of the year but I don't mix my humidors into the wine cellar as I want that 68F+ temp year round for the sticks. 

Just my thoughts on things. 


"What should we start with?"
"An '82 Margaux."
"Is it good?"
"Good? It will make you believe in God!"


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## beerhound34 (Oct 6, 2015)

Thanks for the tips Chamagne InHand. Thats one of my major concerns is that the temp is too low for proper storage.


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## CraigT78 (Apr 14, 2015)

beerhound34 said:


> So my amazing wife got me a new humi for my B-Day a couple weeks ago. Since she has started dabbling in the hobby she figured I needed a bigger humi to store more cigars for the both of us. She found the "Clevelander" model and thought the stainless steel would match the kegerators. While I was supper stoked at the wife's gift, this thing has been a little concerning. The temp only goes up to 64 and the shelves seem like they might be spanish cedar (same grain pattern) but are sealed with a poly or some other type of clear coat.
> 
> So here's the problem I need help/advise/ get a Noob straightened out posts made. The unit has been sitting a week and a half now. I let it sit as is for two days before plugging it in. During those two days it sat at 68* and 65 rh. I then turned it on and set the temp on 64. Problem now is the internal thermo says 59 degrees and has been staying around that. The humidity level is hovering around 51. I purchased a pound of heartfelt beads and got them on Saturday. I split the pound of beads into two of the HF mesh bags. At first i don't think i misted the beads enough as they sat in there for two days with an increase in the rh by only 5. So i dumped all the beads out onto a cookie sheet, got the majority of the beads clear and now back into the mesh bags.
> 
> ...


I can't help much with the humidity issues as I use KL and not beads, but I can tell you that everything I have read about temperature says that anything under 75 degrees to 50 degrees is fine, with aging slowing down closer you go to 50. I wouldn't send it back, as there is also potential as it breaks in that the temp won't be as cold. Have you checked the temp against the internal thermo? I know my kegerator temp is always off, compared to a digital I keep in there. Might not hurt to spot check it with another thermometer.


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## beerhound34 (Oct 6, 2015)

So 55-59 degrees wouldn't be too cold? DO i need to bring the cigars closer to room temp before smoking them? I have two digital hygro's that display the temp and humidity. One is built in to one of the shelves and the other one I just bought. They both are reading within 1 degree of each other and around the 55-59. Curious if those with the Wynter coolers are registering colder than the external display. The Clevelander model temp only goes up to 64 so i can't turn it up to get the temp any higher....


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## elco69 (May 1, 2013)

beerhound34 said:


> So 55-59 degrees wouldn't be too cold? DO i need to bring the cigars closer to room temp before smoking them? I have two digital hygro's that display the temp and humidity. One is built in to one of the shelves and the other one I just bought. They both are reading within 1 degree of each other and around the 55-59. Curious if those with the Wynter coolers are registering colder than the external display. The Clevelander model temp only goes up to 64 so i can't turn it up to get the temp any higher....


Both my Whynters are within a degree of what my hygro says. 55-59 is not bad, but it will keep your RH a little lower, maybe 1% or so. Both my Whynters stay at 64 degrees, while my NC Whynter is around 65% and my CC Whynter is about 63%


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## Champagne InHand (Sep 14, 2015)

temperature greatly effects the amount of water in the air as relative humidity holds such more water as temps increase. I would pull a cigar at 55F and hope it smoked well at room temperature or warmer. Its all a matter of how much moisture you prefer in you cigar. I guess a cooler stick would have less wetness that some cigars have when they come from online retailers. I wouldn't stress it too much. My cellar is passive and is around 52F in Winter with 70% rH and gets up to 66F at Summers peek but with almost 80%rH It is much more damp in Summer, but in Winter it still feels like there is water in the air, but when looking at humidity outside when its cooler, say 50F, I am always shock to see humidity in the high 60s as it felt so much drier to the skin.


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## Bizumpy (Nov 14, 2014)

Temps in the 50s are way too low for cigars, no matter the RH. Air at that temp will not have enough water holding capacity to keep cigars at the proper moisture level. Even at an RH close to 100%.

You're looking for an ABSOLUTE humidity of 12-13 grams of water per cubic meter of air (g/m^3). You can only get that with temps and RH in the mid 60s to (very) low 70s.

Find an RH to AH converter online and run some numbers and you'll see. Temp plays a huge role in the ability of air to hold moisture. In short, there's more water in air at 70/70 than there is at 55 F when it's about to rain (99% RH).



Champagne InHand said:


> My cellar is passive and is around 52F in Winter with 70% rH and gets up to 66F at Summers peek but with almost 80%rH It is much more damp in Summer, but in Winter it still feels like there is water in the air, but when looking at humidity outside when its cooler, say 50F, I am always shock to see humidity in the high 60s as it felt so much drier to the skin.


52 F at 70% RH has the same moisture content as 65 F at 45% RH or 70 F at 38% RH. Waaaay too dry.

The air in your humidor in Summer has almost twice the amount of moisture in it than it does in Winter. (13 g/m^3 vs a little over 7 g/m^3).


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## Van_Wilderness (Sep 25, 2015)

The curious thing I find about the OP's post is that the drawers have been clear coated/sealed. I would think that would completely nullify any seasoning of the spanish cedar. I'm not familiar with woodworking but wouldn't it make sense to knock down that clear coat with some really fine grain sandpaper so that the wood can be seasoned, absorb some moisture and do its job within the sealed environment?


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## droy1958 (Sep 3, 2014)

I would be looking for a RH from 58 to 65, and a temp from 65 to 70 for smoking. I have no problem with 70 RH for long term storage of your cigars. Just get the RH down before you light up, as 70 seems to be too much humidity when you marry up a flame with the cigar.....YMMV...


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## Champagne InHand (Sep 14, 2015)

Bizumpy said:


> Temps in the 50s are way too low for cigars, no matter the RH. Air at that temp will not have enough water holding capacity to keep cigars at the proper moisture level. Even at an RH close to 100%.
> 
> You're looking for an ABSOLUTE humidity of 12-13 grams of water per cubic meter of air (g/m^3). You can only get that with temps and RH in the mid 60s to (very) low 70s.
> 
> ...


I don't store my humidors in my wine cellar. I was just commenting on the temps and humidity of the passive wine cellar. In wines it doesn't get much better than those temps and humidity. The wine and corks need high humidity but too high and you have all the labels wrecked.

Sorry if it looked that I was referring to cigar storage at those temps. I keep my humidors and tupperdors upstairs in my bedroom where it's 73F-68F. The humidors are around 68-70% rH.

I personally wouldn't store cigars under 65F ever. Nor would I have them up above 75F either.

I have been doing wine collaring for a long time. This is my third cellar. It has been correctly storing wine for about 10 years and has about 900 bottles right now with that number to rise above 1000 in the next 2 weeks as the Fall shipping window gets into full swing.

I don't mix cigar and wine storage. The string tobacco odors would be seriously detrimental to the wines. The wine cellar does have a great aroma of hard wood racking. Mostly Spruce, Redwood with some Poplar, Oak and Cedar.

I could take a nap in there if there was room. 
I also love the smells of the humidors with the cigars and red cedar giving off pleasing odors when the boxes are opened up.

What shall we have? An '82 Margaux! Is it any good? Good....?, It will make you believe in God!


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## droy1958 (Sep 3, 2014)

Van_Wilderness said:


> The curious thing I find about the OP's post is that the drawers have been clear coated/sealed. I would think that would completely nullify any seasoning of the spanish cedar. I'm not familiar with woodworking but wouldn't it make sense to knock down that clear coat with some really fine grain sandpaper so that the wood can be seasoned, absorb some moisture and do its job within the sealed environment?


Yep, and it makes me wonder if it's Spanish Cedar. Nothing against the OP, but why would you seal one of the "strong points" of the humidor?...One of those things that make you scratch your @$$ and go "hmmmmm"....


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## Champagne InHand (Sep 14, 2015)

I would use a very fine grit paper or block and take most of that coating off. Spanish cedar is kiln dried so it will absorb the humidity and hold it in the box. It also will absorb some of the tobacco odors and mix them gently as it lets go of the moisture and pulls it in. I've never seen a sealed cedar lining. 

In clothing chests it keeps moths away from wool and that sure beats the smell of mothballs. 

I'm curious as why they would seal or coat it as well. Though I have seen many people who use sealed racking in wine cellars but my racking is all in coated save one table top half rack which holds dessert wines and large format bottles that sit on their bottoms rather than lay horizontal. 

Could it be white cedar? My cedar rack is a half sized and no matter how old it gets, it puts minuscule cedar oil onto the back labels on the bottles marring them. Perhaps they coated the cedar not wanting any oils to touch the cigars? Perhaps or maybe an oversight. 


What shall we have? An '82 Margaux! Is it any good? Good....?, It will make you believe in God!


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## beerhound34 (Oct 6, 2015)

Thanks for all the input everyone. I am learning so much on this site, it's amazing the wealth of knowledge on here. What I am taking away from this is that the low temp might be what is contributing to my inability to get the rh out of the low 50's. As for the shelving, I mentioned it for the main reason of being suspect of what it is. I have about a dozen board feet of spanish ceader on it's way here as we speak. I have a nice "little" wood shop in the basement so building REAL custom shelves will be easy and fun! I will probably sand one of the original shelves down and do a little more investigating. If nothing else maybe I can save someone else from buying this unit if its this bad. Considering i can't raise the temp any higher than 64 (which is keeping it at 55) it might be worth sending it back.


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## mikebot (Sep 17, 2015)

Happy to hear you're getting a wineador up and running, Steve! My NewAir reads 66° on the digital control display, but all my temps inside are all around 70°, and I'm okay with that. While the Boveda calibration kit seems to be a great way to calibrate for RH, I still haven't found a way to calibrate temp without dropping the sensor in a pot of boiling water. I imagine that wouldn't fare well. Building your own Spanish cedar shelves sounds fun, and would be more worthwhile than messing with the sealed shelves it came with. I have noticed the large volume of unsealed, seasoned Spanish cedar has been the single most helpful addition to my wineador in regulating RH. Just make sure you get everything dialed in before I ship out my NOOB PIF.... Hehe.


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## beerhound34 (Oct 6, 2015)

mikebot said:


> Happy to hear you're getting a wineador up and running, Steve! My NewAir reads 66° on the digital control display, but all my temps inside are all around 70°, and I'm okay with that. While the Boveda calibration kit seems to be a great way to calibrate for RH, I still haven't found a way to calibrate temp without dropping the sensor in a pot of boiling water. I imagine that wouldn't fare well. Building your own Spanish cedar shelves sounds fun, and would be more worthwhile than messing with the sealed shelves it came with. I have noticed the large volume of unsealed, seasoned Spanish cedar has been the single most helpful addition to my wineador in regulating RH. Just make sure you get everything dialed in before I ship out my NOOB PIF.... Hehe.


Mike- I almost wish mine would be registering a couple degrees above the setting instead of 9 degrees below lol! I figured with two different digital hygrometers both within 1 of each other they are probably pretty spot on. No worries on the NOOB PIF I still have my 50 count desktop humi good to go with a little room left in it. I just want to be like all the others on here and start building a huge collection to keep some stashed away for aging. Hard to do that is a desk top humi! I guess i can always go the cooler route if this winedor type humi doesn't work out.


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## elco69 (May 1, 2013)

mikebot said:


> Steve! My NewAir reads 66° on the digital control display, but all my temps inside are all around 70°, and I'm okay with that.


Just FYI, that readout on the top of your New Air is not the temp inside, but the target temp that you want you cooler to work towards. So if it is 70 inside, your cooler would stay on until it hits 66 or slightly lower then shuts off, like the thermostat on your house.


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## mikebot (Sep 17, 2015)

elco69 said:


> Just FYI, that readout on the top of your New Air is not the temp inside, but the target temp that you want you cooler to work towards. So if it is 70 inside, your cooler would stay on until it hits 66 or slightly lower then shuts off, like the thermostat on your house.


This is a great point. I have only had my NewAir for a few months now, and we are in the peak heat of summer in SoCal, so the cooler pretty much runs 24/7. I am thinking the thermoelectric technology can only cool down to a temperature differential of approx 10-15 degrees (approx 80 degrees ambient in the apartment minus 10 degrees = 70 degrees inside the cooler). I am wondering how the temps will fluctuate in the winter months. Maybe it will actually make it to 66 degrees during winter.


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## mikebot (Sep 17, 2015)

beerhound34 said:


> Mike- I almost wish mine would be registering a couple degrees above the setting instead of 9 degrees below lol! I figured with two different digital hygrometers both within 1 of each other they are probably pretty spot on. No worries on the NOOB PIF I still have my 50 count desktop humi good to go with a little room left in it. I just want to be like all the others on here and start building a huge collection to keep some stashed away for aging. Hard to do that is a desk top humi! I guess i can always go the cooler route if this winedor type humi doesn't work out.


You're well on your way to a huge collection, my friend! We will dedicate ourselves to getting you there! Just curious, what's the ambient room temperature where you keep the cooler?


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## beerhound34 (Oct 6, 2015)

mikebot said:


> You're well on your way to a huge collection, my friend! We will dedicate ourselves to getting you there! Just curious, what's the ambient room temperature where you keep the cooler?


I am a young grasshopper here to learn!!!! So the ambient room temp is around 66-68 degrees. That's part of the frustration, when i had it just sitting for it's first two days to let it settle from shipping, the temp held at around 66 the whole time with a rh of 64. After i plugged it in it gradually dropped down in the 50's for both temp and rh and wont come up. I guess i could just leave it unplugged but then i wont get the air flow benefit. My desk top humi sits in the same room and stays around 67* with a 65 rh. So frustrating right now......


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## pocoluz (Mar 2, 2016)

I have the same issue with my Clevlander. I unplugged it to see if it will stabilize. I don't see a problem with temps in the 50's because it only slows the aging process. Cigars don't need ample aging like wine. They just need to mellow after three or more months, mostly. If you're looking to develop plume then it depends on the cigar and the oils that are present, at which case a year will show progress under those temps. Temps aren't important as air flow is a gimmick to sell you an active humidifier that costs $100 dollars. Just think of tubos that are sealed. Some age when they're not completely sealed but air flow is not needed in the extremity of a fan circulating air. Air will naturally envelope and dissipate as time passes. I hope this helps the next person who buys this unit. Also, I was hoping the Clevlander would shut of after falling from the temp. threshold but it does not appear to be operating the way they advertise on First class humidors, which provides minimal information on the unit. I'm not sure it is Spanish Cedar racks; I will have to call and confirm.


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## WinsorHumidors (Feb 16, 2016)

@Van_Wilderness

Spanish cedar is very porous ... someone who puts a clear coat on it just ruined the benefits of SC as that stuff just penetrated pretty deep into the wood, as absorption of humidity and aroma are the primary benefits of SC (the longer a cigar stays in a properly manufactured humidor ... read aromatic SC ... the better it ages) both of those primary benefits of the SC are compromised.

Clear coat ... meh ... terrible decision ... the point being I don't believe anyone could sand enough to get past the clear coat and back to a functioning SC. Contract someone to make you some SC shelves to your specific needs if you are concerned. However, I don't think that avenue is worth the expense as the cost outweighs the benefits (depending upon your level of concern and how deep your pockets are).

Finally, and in all truthfulness, SC is not a necessary component of humidors. It's nice to have but not mandatory. I've been considering walnut trays (leaving the SC for the lining of a humidor) ... the only caveat is that the chosen wood cannot have an aroma and it cannot be finished with anything that has a persistent odor.

CT


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